![]() ![]() The desert surrounding Copiapó, the capital of Chile’s Atacama Region, is no stranger to mineral extraction. “And not only here in Copiapó but in all of Chile, there are rivers and lakes that have disappeared-all because a company has a lot more right to water than we do as human beings or citizens of Chile.” There isn’t a drop of water,” says Rivera. “We used to have a river before that now doesn’t exist. While mining operations squeeze this already dry region even drier, communities lose their access to potable water, leaving them relying on tankers to deliver it. “Communities are suffering a slow violence that’s creating conditions of ecological exhaustion.”Ī legacy of the Pinochet era in Chile is the privatization of minerals and water, which gives companies ownership of those resources in an area. Blair, assistant professor at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona and a coauthor of a new NRDC report on lithium mining in South America. “This method of brine evaporation is egregious, and it's senseless,” says James J.A. ![]() ![]() The technique drains already scarce water resources, damages wetlands, and harms communities. Miners pump salty lithium-containing water, called brine, into massive ponds, where it can take years for the evaporation process to separate the lithium. The latter method is by far the most water-intensive. Southwest and through the evaporation of brines found beneath salt flats on South America’s Atacama Plateau. The metal can be extracted in three ways: from hard rock, which is common in Australia from sedimentary rock, a process currently under development in the U.S. Chile is the second-largest producer of lithium, a critical component of the batteries that power electric vehicles, smart devices, renewable power plants, and other technologies helping the world transition away from fossil fuels. ![]()
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